This is my first entry for Ludum Dare and I'm fairly happy with how it turned out.

I wanted to focus on an escape attempt against impossible odds, which turned out pretty well. It's essentially a frantic game of attrition, getting quicker and quicker until The Runner ultimately dies. With any luck, you'll get more and more panicked as your Light starts to dwindle and more and more enemies start to spawn.

The controls and instructions are in-game, but let me know if anything needs explaining.

The graphical style ended up looking really cool in action, but there are a few things I would change if I did it again (most of them involving getting more sleep and ingesting less caffeine in some way).

One major note that I forgot to put into the instructions is that powerups have a chance to drop from enemies when they die. Light+ boosts The Guide's Light radius (which has a hard limit) and Move+ permanently increases The Guide's movement speed.

More than anything else in the game, I didn't like the fact that your ability to generate Light is based entirely on luck. I've toyed with the idea of being able to regenerate light by being near a lantern (and the people who playtested it mentioned it too), but I couldn't get it implemented in a way in which it doesn't break the balance of the game.

Hints and Tips:
- Don't pick up too many Speed+ powerups! More control is often needed.
- Use the Lanterns to your advantage. Although they're not the best shield, they'll do in a pinch if you're low on Light.
- Don't kill every Flyer you see. They always release a Red Bullet when they die. Sometimes you're better off leaving them.
- When your COMBO hits 20/40/60/..., if you're not on full ammo for your right-click weapon, you'll get 1 ammo.
- Only use your right-click weapon when it's essential. It resets your COMBO and significantly hinders your score.

Let me know what you think of it and what score you get, my highest is 122460!

Tools used:
Game Maker
bfxr